In my last post I mentioned the book Surviv(her) featuring the cancer experience of young women. I would like to echo the words of Kristin who was diagnosed at age 21. She says: "The whole point of getting cancer is to wake up and do something different. What would you change? What parts of my life aren't I happy with right now? Everything is just broken and now I can start from scratch."
After I was diagnosed with Stage 4 Renal Cell Carcinoma, every new morning seemed somehow to be a special day. I realized that time in the sunlight of this life was precious, and that I needed to consider each day as very valuable, and that I needed to change my priorities. What could I do to help another person in my life? What did I hang on to that was just frivolous and of no value and should be got rid of?
After remission in October 2018 I still keep up my natural healing regimen of supplements that are considered to prevent or reduce cancer, as well as injections three times a week of Iscador (a derivative of mistletoe developed to battle cancer in Germany). And I keep discovering new things.
I have mentioned that getting shingles was one side effect of my chemo experience. Although the nasty shingles pain still persists it is somewhat reduced from what it was a few months ago. Then I read that turmeric (with the active ingredient being curcumin) is a pain reliever. Now I have been taking curcumin in the morning for months. But at nights I have some joint pain problems (shoulder, hip) and sometimes the shingles pain wakes me up. So I decided to take my high potency curcumin at night just before I go to bed. Voila! Joint pain and neurological pain from shingles no longer wake me up. I can now get a good night's sleep.
Also I have just received what I consider to be an honour. There is to be a living with chronic disease (prevention, self-management and care) workshop in Yellowknife on December 5 (two weeks away) and I have been asked by the territorial Cancer Care Specialist for the NWT Health Authority to be there as a patient contributor to the workshop from my experience as a chronic cancer sufferer living in a remote community of the NWT. I will decide by tomorrow if I will attend and make a 10 - 15 minute presentation from my cancer treatment and recovery perspective.
Wednesday, 21 November 2018
Friday, 16 November 2018
The Cancer Sharing Circle, CBC News, and community support
I was interviewed by Mackenzie Scott for CBC North as a participant in our local Cancer Sharing Circle that has met a couple of times this fall here in Inuvik. It aired on radio this afternoon and will available in digital form on the weekend.
Taking part in the Sharing Circle enables me to share parts of my story that give other cancer sufferers hope. Hope is a big thing in cancer recovery. As I have mentioned before, belief in recovery brings hope.
Our Sharing Circle here in Inuvik is for cancer patients, survivors, caregivers, relatives of cancer patients/survivors and anyone interested in cancer recovery. Participation certainly takes away the common feeling of loneliness and isolation for a person with cancer. And I suppose it is easier to make a Sharing Circle successful in a small community where it is a common thing for people to come together to help one another.
Fear is another common emotion as well as feelings of loneliness. And fear, being a negative emotion, can encourage cancer growth instead of combat it. So it is important to change fear into faith for cancer acceptance and recovery.
I have discovered an advantage of living in a small isolated community. And that is that people truly care about you. The news travels fast when a person is ill. I have been approached by many elders in the community, expressing how happy they are when they heard I was in remission from my kidney cancer. And I am on a first name basis with everyone in the local pharmacy and drug store, including the pharmacist and all the pharmacist helpers.
Speaking of support for cancer patients and survivors, young women face special problems. They are just entering the age of marriage and parenthood. See www.survivher.ca for information on the Surviv(her) movement. I have bought the book entitled Surviv(her) and the stories of young survivors is truly inspiring. All of the sales $ for books and other items go directly to women't cancer research. The author of the book and the website is Dr Amy Morris, a cancer pharmacist in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. If you google her name you will see many news stories about this inspiring young cancer survivor.
Taking part in the Sharing Circle enables me to share parts of my story that give other cancer sufferers hope. Hope is a big thing in cancer recovery. As I have mentioned before, belief in recovery brings hope.
Our Sharing Circle here in Inuvik is for cancer patients, survivors, caregivers, relatives of cancer patients/survivors and anyone interested in cancer recovery. Participation certainly takes away the common feeling of loneliness and isolation for a person with cancer. And I suppose it is easier to make a Sharing Circle successful in a small community where it is a common thing for people to come together to help one another.
Fear is another common emotion as well as feelings of loneliness. And fear, being a negative emotion, can encourage cancer growth instead of combat it. So it is important to change fear into faith for cancer acceptance and recovery.
I have discovered an advantage of living in a small isolated community. And that is that people truly care about you. The news travels fast when a person is ill. I have been approached by many elders in the community, expressing how happy they are when they heard I was in remission from my kidney cancer. And I am on a first name basis with everyone in the local pharmacy and drug store, including the pharmacist and all the pharmacist helpers.
Speaking of support for cancer patients and survivors, young women face special problems. They are just entering the age of marriage and parenthood. See www.survivher.ca for information on the Surviv(her) movement. I have bought the book entitled Surviv(her) and the stories of young survivors is truly inspiring. All of the sales $ for books and other items go directly to women't cancer research. The author of the book and the website is Dr Amy Morris, a cancer pharmacist in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. If you google her name you will see many news stories about this inspiring young cancer survivor.
Tuesday, 6 November 2018
More on belief and recovery
I have mentioned Stephen Hawking's struggle with his ALS disease and his determination to make discoveries as one of the world's most brilliant scientists in spite of his incredible handicap. A conventionally wise ALS expert has insisted in an interview that Hawking's determination to survive would have had nothing to do with extending his life! When will western medicine get the hint that maybe, just maybe, there are links (well proven in many books and research reports on cancer recovery) between physical disease and the power of the mind.
Another ALS sufferer is Steven Wells of Canada who is in his mid fifties, having been diagnosed at 21. I wonder how much his positive belief has influenced his life. Here is a quotation from UK Prime Minister Winston Churchill during WW2 on Steven Wells' wall:
“Sure I am this day we are masters of our fate, that the task which has been set before us is not above our strength; that its pangs and toils are not beyond our endurance. As long as we have faith in our own cause and an unconquerable will to win, victory will not be denied us.”
I have been studying and comparing how the very similar kidney cancer scenarios of my cousin Karen, two decades younger, and I came to the very same impasse at the point where we both independently though 18 months apart came to realize and were told that chemotherapy would not work against Renal Cell Carcinoma. Karen could not afford to be put on the recommended immunotherapy Opdivo (Nivolumab) because it was not covered by her medical insurance in the US. She was forced to continue on Sutent chemo for another year. By the time she was able to get on immunotherapy it was too late and she died in mid September 2017. At the same point in my prognosis I could not tolerate chemo so was put on Opdivo which was paid for by our helpful Canadian health system.
I also am saddened again by the realization that Karen would not consider special naturopathic treatment as a possibility for her. She would only follow what the oncologist recommended for treatment. I on the other hand have made several special dietary changes, and inject Iscador (mistletoe treatment developed against cancer in Germany) three times a week. I continue the dietary regimen and Iscador but have had not immunotherapy now since mid July 2018 and my cancer is in remission.
It is true that naturopathic doctors are not (yet) regulated to there are good ones and there are bad ones. You must ask around to find a good one. We are fortunate to have a very good Naturopathic Doctor in Yellowknife, NT, Dr Nicole Redvers, who has literally saved our lives through her suggested interventions for different medical issues.
We have dear friends down in Illinois and Wisconsin who are facing the same situation and, like Karen's predicament, they refuse to consider anything other than whatever chemo treatment the oncologist in Wisconsin in has recommended.
I am sure that many cancer sufferers are confused and may wish for alternatives to chemo but don't know how to approach it with their doctor or oncologist. Here are some questions to ask:
1) Does your cancer clinic have a specially trained nutritionist, or a special nutrition program, for cancer patients? (Many clinics do, including the Cross Cancer Institute in Edmonton Alberta, and the clinic at the University of Wisconsin as examples)
2) Do you support natural healing protocols to work with chemotherapy and immunotherapy to reduce tumor growth?
3) Do you support using mistletoe (Iscador) as developed in Germany to treat various cancers?
4) Can you put me on immunotherapy as soon as possible? (medical systems across North America insist that a person be put on chemotherapy first even when it is known that chemo will be ineffective.
That's all for now. Keep happy and healthy.
Another ALS sufferer is Steven Wells of Canada who is in his mid fifties, having been diagnosed at 21. I wonder how much his positive belief has influenced his life. Here is a quotation from UK Prime Minister Winston Churchill during WW2 on Steven Wells' wall:
“Sure I am this day we are masters of our fate, that the task which has been set before us is not above our strength; that its pangs and toils are not beyond our endurance. As long as we have faith in our own cause and an unconquerable will to win, victory will not be denied us.”
I have been studying and comparing how the very similar kidney cancer scenarios of my cousin Karen, two decades younger, and I came to the very same impasse at the point where we both independently though 18 months apart came to realize and were told that chemotherapy would not work against Renal Cell Carcinoma. Karen could not afford to be put on the recommended immunotherapy Opdivo (Nivolumab) because it was not covered by her medical insurance in the US. She was forced to continue on Sutent chemo for another year. By the time she was able to get on immunotherapy it was too late and she died in mid September 2017. At the same point in my prognosis I could not tolerate chemo so was put on Opdivo which was paid for by our helpful Canadian health system.
I also am saddened again by the realization that Karen would not consider special naturopathic treatment as a possibility for her. She would only follow what the oncologist recommended for treatment. I on the other hand have made several special dietary changes, and inject Iscador (mistletoe treatment developed against cancer in Germany) three times a week. I continue the dietary regimen and Iscador but have had not immunotherapy now since mid July 2018 and my cancer is in remission.
It is true that naturopathic doctors are not (yet) regulated to there are good ones and there are bad ones. You must ask around to find a good one. We are fortunate to have a very good Naturopathic Doctor in Yellowknife, NT, Dr Nicole Redvers, who has literally saved our lives through her suggested interventions for different medical issues.
We have dear friends down in Illinois and Wisconsin who are facing the same situation and, like Karen's predicament, they refuse to consider anything other than whatever chemo treatment the oncologist in Wisconsin in has recommended.
I am sure that many cancer sufferers are confused and may wish for alternatives to chemo but don't know how to approach it with their doctor or oncologist. Here are some questions to ask:
1) Does your cancer clinic have a specially trained nutritionist, or a special nutrition program, for cancer patients? (Many clinics do, including the Cross Cancer Institute in Edmonton Alberta, and the clinic at the University of Wisconsin as examples)
2) Do you support natural healing protocols to work with chemotherapy and immunotherapy to reduce tumor growth?
3) Do you support using mistletoe (Iscador) as developed in Germany to treat various cancers?
4) Can you put me on immunotherapy as soon as possible? (medical systems across North America insist that a person be put on chemotherapy first even when it is known that chemo will be ineffective.
That's all for now. Keep happy and healthy.
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